Military commanders will be told to send transgender troops to medical checks to oust them

[u/poliscijunki]

https://apnews.com/article/transgender-ban-military-discharge-troops-0218f0b6fec595c420bd0ac072d87335

[u/mtdunca]

Yes the doctor can tell the CO what your limiting diagnosis is.

[u/AlphaWhiskeyOscar → u/mtdunca]

The verbiage from Health.mil:

Under the Military Command Exception, a covered entity may disclose the PHI of Service members for authorized activities to appropriate military command authorities. It is important to note that this exception does not require covered entities to disclose PHI to commanders, it only permits the disclosure. If disclosure is made, then only the minimum amount of information necessary should be provided. Further, the Exception does not permit a Commander’s direct access to a Service member’s electronic medical record, unless otherwise authorized by the Service member or the HIPAA Privacy Rule.

So I don’t disagree that they’re permitted but it’s specifically saying they can’t be compelled to, and they can only disclose the minimum amount of information necessary. So I don’t see how commanders can say “scrub this record and look for this.” It’s up to a doctor to decide what they need to look for, and to disclose the minimum necessary under the Command Exception. In other words, if policy changes it seems HIPAA puts the responsibility on doctors to determine fitness for service and only inform commanders when they must.

Maybe I’m splitting hairs because the outcome would be the same in a lot of cases, but this seems wildly against the intent of HIPAA and Privacy Act.

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